


Here Quiet Find

by cassieoh_draws (cassieoh), werebear



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: (but heavy on the comfort), Bedsharing, Bubonic Plague 1666, Explicit Scenes of Cuddling, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pining, Quarantine, Unresolved but Hopeful Ending, not your typical quarantine fic?, touch starvation, transgressive foot washing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2020-07-26
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:08:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25513324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cassieoh/pseuds/cassieoh_draws, https://archiveofourown.org/users/werebear/pseuds/werebear
Summary: August 1666 — Crowley follows the mysterious beacon of Aziraphale’s distress and finds him in Eyam — an English village under quarantine for the bubonic plague.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 45
Kudos: 162
Collections: Good Omens Mini Bang, Hurt Aziraphale





	Here Quiet Find

**Author's Note:**

> From the author: I know that it’s nigh incredible, given current events, but I actually started writing this back in July 2019, I swear. I’m sorry it’s suddenly so unfortunately relevant.  
> Many thanks to my betas for this one, [losyanya,](http://losyanya.tumblr.com) [standalone](http://archiveofourown.org/users/standalone/pseuds/standalone), and [magiwren](http://archiveofourown.org/users/magiwren/pseuds/magiwren); and to the artist, cassieoh -- you've been so delightful to work with! 
> 
> From the artist: This was such a fun partnership! And the fic is absolutely gorgeous, so many great moments to illustrate, y'all're gonna love it <3 (if you like the art I can be found [here](https://cassieoh.carrd.co/)) 
> 
> \--
> 
> _Balm of my heart, here rest awhile,  
>  Here quiet find—the thrush that calls,  
> The fever sooth’d, the shadow falls  
> No more. …_

**_1666_ **  
**_Derbyshire Dales, England_ **

It’s two hours past midday, it’s August, and it’s bloody hot.

It doesn’t help that Crowley’s wearing black and brown and murrey. Woolen hose and breeches and the new long, slimmer fitting coat that he’s quite sure is about to catch on in a big way.

It isn’t the fourteenth century, but it’s bad enough.

And that ever-blesséd angel’s distress has been vibrating in his head for days.

Crowley is walking, because horses are his true adversaries on this mortal plane, even when they’re hitched to a carriage. (Privately, he suspects that, deep down, they sense his serpentine nature and want to stomp him. Aziraphale says that’s nonsense, but Crowley’s seen the flare of those velvety nostrils when he walks by, and he doesn’t trust them for a second.) So Crowley is walking, in the heat, along a dusty English road, because horses are the worst, and because he doesn’t want to accidentally lead any infernal spies straight to the angel’s location, by, say, teleporting directly to his vicinity. He especially doesn’t want any of said spies to know that that’s even a possibility.

And anyway it doesn’t feel like an _emergency_ distress.

It started softly, a couple of weeks ago. Crowley hasn’t seen Aziraphale for, hm. A year or two? When was it? He remembers they went to a show once London reopened the theatres, finally. ( _Bloody Puritans,_ he grouses inwardly, his current get-up notwithstanding. He wears it _ironically,_ all right?) And he bought Aziraphale some of that new drinking chocolate, around the same time—the angel started out by complaining how different it was from the xocolatl they’d had in Tikal several centuries ago, but he did approve of the new sweetness. (By the end of the cup, he was savoring it with his eyes closed, and Crowley found himself oddly unable to look away from the angel’s humming mouth, his delighted expression.)

Regardless, he noticed the unmistakable prickle of Aziraphale’s distress in his head last month. It curls in a sort of channel, up his spine, the back of his neck, around behind his ears, up behind his forehead and eyes. It’s not a sound exactly, though sometimes his senses want to interpret it that way—it’s more a vibration? And it varies—usually it comes in a low undercurrent, with the occasional brief spike of intensity. This time, it was so soft at first that he brushed it off, occupied with his own latest assignments. (Increased quotas, what a bloody nuisance.) It isn’t like he hasn’t felt mild flutters of dismay from the angel on a semi-regular basis, ever since… since when? He’s not sure he could pinpoint when it started, exactly. Before the Welsh rebellion incident, before the Viking raid on that monastery, when Crowley popped in just in time, certainly. That one had been so strong he’d felt almost dragged along; it reminded him of the _very_ Early Days, slithering too long in the desert. Like sand-burn of the brain.

Normally it isn’t nearly that intense. He didn’t realize what it even was at first, back in the early days. Only that it caught his attention, and that the vibration was somehow… directional. A tug. Towards... wherever a certain angel is.

Crowley isn’t sure he understands it even now, to be quite honest. He’s just barely starting to identify that there are different emotions in it at different times, and he’s not entirely confident in his ability to differentiate. He doesn’t know why it keeps happening, either. And there’s no one to ask, is there; it certainly isn’t something he’s going to discuss with anyone else. Not even Aziraphale.

(Especially not Aziraphale.)

Crowley sighs. It’s hardly the only thing he doesn’t understand.

Crowley pauses in the shadow of a copse of elms, near a stone waymarker at a crossroads, pushing up his hat and scrubbing at his forehead with the heel of his hand. He slouches against the largest tree and tries to think. Or not to think.

Why is he even here, honestly? (‘Why’ is a dangerous question.) (What question isn’t?)

Just checking in, that’s all. It makes sense to check up, preserve the mutually beneficial Arrangement they have going, right? There’s no need to poke into why, into this thing he doesn’t understand. What good does it do?

So never mind _why_ he can hear an angel, somehow, through the ether. Never mind why he knows where he is, more or less.

Never mind why he wants to see him. It’s not important. Anyway, maybe he _doesn’t_ want to see him. It’s pathetic for demons to want things, or admit to it, anyway. Fastest way to show weakness, admitting to wanting something, that’s just basics.

He doesn’t have to admit to anything, not to anyone. Lying, dissembling, twisting the truth—all firmly within his purview. It’s his job. (It’s also practically his job to indulge in a few lustful thoughts from time to time. Doesn’t mean a thing.)

Sure, he tries to be honest with himself. Sometimes. It doesn’t do for a demon to be too self-aware. Gotta ration that shit.

So never mind why he’s decided to come here. He just has, and that’s bad, or good, enough, for now.

Crowley sighs. He leans up from the tree, elaborately, and trudges on down the road.

—

By the time Crowley’s entered the next town, he’s sure: this time the call is definitely distress, albeit mostly low-grade. Crowley’s glad enough to get away from going back to London any time soon. He had quite enough of the plague back in 1350, thanks ever so. (Enough and more than enough. He shudders, and carefully does not think back.)

But right now… he checks in with the signaling—a low uneasy buzz, like a beehive—then tries to dampen it down, temporarily, so he can look around. Focus. Right now he’s close enough, and the buzz of it is constant enough, that he’s not sure exactly where to go next. This town is called Stoney Middle-something. Crowley doesn’t think he’s actually _here,_ but he can ask around. Aziraphale’s corporeal form is usually pretty constant through the years, though Crowley doesn’t want to try to _describe_ him, that’s just going to be embarrassing…

Well, start with the obvious, he supposes. He stops at the bakery on the main street and ducks inside. A large woman with large arms is pulling a tray of loaves out of a roaring stone oven. She raises an eyebrow at his Puritan outfit, or maybe his dark spectacles, made of tinted crystal and wire and leather, but merely asks, “What can I do for ye, stranger?”

“Yeah, I’m looking for a fellow, been through here some time in the last few days, or weeks.” Probably. It’s not like he has an itinerary.

“A friend of yours, dearie?” she asks, pleasantly enough, setting down the tray and sliding another into the oven in its place.

Crowley blinks. ( _‘Oh, he’s not my friend,’_ he remembers, with gritted teeth. But he also remembers that same voice saying, ‘ _...they would_ destroy _you,’_ with such soft, aching dismay.) There’s no way for him to know what name Aziraphale’s going by lately. (And he avoids saying the angel’s name aloud anyway, when he can.) He braces himself. “Yeah. Kind face, curly white hair, he’s sort of…” argh, what is his life, “bumbly and earnest? Enthusiastic about baked goods?”

“Ohhh,” she says, with instant recognition, “Brother Alric!” Crowley doesn’t even have time to process _that_ (he’s still using that name? From that stupid exorcism incident?) before he registers that her face has fallen. His throat tightens, preemptively. “Oh, sir, I’m sorry—he was here, about two months ago, talking with Amos at the smithy, he was, but—”

As she pauses, Crowley feels the buzzing of the angel’s distress spike suddenly, sharply, a tight pulse, and he has to stop himself from spinning around, rushing out to tear through every building he sees, searching. “But what,” Crowley manages to grit out.

Her face is creased with sympathy, and Crowley already can’t stand it. “My boy Philip, he saw him—I’m so sorry, sir. He’s over in Eyam now, just up to the northwest.”

“Eyam?”

“The plague village.”

—

Crowley doesn’t quite register most of the rest of what the baker woman says. He only realizes that he’s agreed to—do what exactly? Deliver some of the bread?—when he finds himself halfway to the boundary stone at the border of the village lands. (It’s not much of a boundary; there’s no wall or guards, just a large stone by the path, a few holes drilled on top. How do they keep people from fleeing the village?) The woman even gave him a fresh roll for his pocket as thanks. She seems to think that he’s planning to leave a note there for Brother Alric, and then come back to Stoney Whatever to wait and see if there’s a response. Which he supposes would be logical.

Fuck logic. What he’s really planning to do, he thinks, teeth gritted as he walks, carrying a sack of bread, some older loaves but some still warm, is to give that bloody idiot angel a piece of his mind.

He leaves the sack at the boundary stone first, though. He did agree to it, after all.

—

Unlike certain thoughtless beings, Crowley _knows better_ than to be seen entering a fucking bloody _plague village_ —he’s barely heard of such a thing in this country; the baker said they’re quarantined—so he stalks away, and then teleports himself to the outskirts of the buildings once it’s full dark, still fuming.

This close, it’s about as horrible as the name promises—he can hear weeping, he can smell blood and boils and gangrene, burning bedding and burning herbs. He can hear the distant sound of a spade, in the fields, cutting earth. Even after nightfall, the evening is still too warm, though it’s starting to descend into a clammy cool, like old sweat.

He checks in with the alarm in his head—the intensity of it is low, numbing: the rattle of a poorly-sprung cart on a long journey. He could probably find him easily enough now, but it’d be inconvenient to be seen or to explain his presence to the humans, and he… He clenches his hands (trembling ever so slightly), and follows his nose to an empty cottage around the east edge of town, the one that smells the most of angel (desert rain, sugared almonds, warm sunlight over cool water).

It’s just one small, narrow room, disquietingly bare, with a dusty pallet bed, a rickety table and pair of stools near the window. He takes off his hat and sits by the cold hearth inside, waiting.

—

He’s sitting, fuming, with his eyes closed, his head tipped against the stone, trying to remember not to smell or hear or breathe as much as is demoniacally possible (he wouldn’t have thought he was so used to breathing, but it’s nearly a reflex by now), when the door scrapes open, slowly.

Crowley sits up, and for a moment, even in this miserable place, even with the angel’s distress still buzzing at him, a part of Crowley uncoils from its tense knot of worry.

Until he looks up.

Even through his glasses, Crowley can see in the dark, of course he can, but at first he’s not entirely sure what in Earth, Heaven, or Hell he’s seeing. It’s Aziraphale, silhouetted against the not-quite-as-dark night air, obviously, but—he’s slightly the wrong shape, and he’s moving strangely, and slow, muttering to himself, and—

His round face, shadowed in a hood, snaps up. “Crowley?”

Crowley doesn’t know what to say first—so many options, he’s choking on them. _Of course it’s me, you nitwit,_ is a strong contender, with _is that really a question, what if it WERE some other demon, are you paying so little attention,_ as a close follow up. He blurts out, “What the bloody fuck are you doing here, angel?”

“Crowley?” Aziraphale’s voice is thick with something—layered, complicated. He jerks forward, a single step, halting. “You’re—you’re here.”

Crowley gaze sharpens. Aziraphale is wearing a pale brown robe, blinking out from a darker hood with a short mantle over his shoulders. There’s a rope belt around his waist—his rather more-skinny-than-usual waist. He looks—not actually thin, only a bit, compared to his normal well-padded figure; he looks worn; he— He leans a long-handled shovel against the door frame, shuts the door, pushes back his hood.

Crowley eels up to his feet, hissing. Aziraphale has dark circles in the pouches of skin under his eyes, and a haunted look in them. And he’s filthy—his face and his hands and his clothing smudged and streaked with dark patches. For a brief moment, vividly, Crowley remembers back to the mid-1400s, remembers facing Aziraphale across a new-fangled printing press in Mainz, remembers him smudged with ink, all over his clothes and his beaming face, remembers his excitement— _“angel, they’ve had this in China and Korea for ages already,”_ Crowley’d said. But his enthusiasm wouldn’t be dampened: _“Yes, true! But I think it’s really going to catch on here this time! Look at this book!”_

The memory fades away. Aziraphale’s face couldn’t be more different here, now. His curls are tangled and wild. He’s staring at Crowley like he thinks he’s seeing things. He looks deflated—sagging, slack with loss of weight, with lack of rest. His sandaled feet are caked with grime.

And the filth on his clothing isn’t ink this time. It’s dirt, and blood, and worse. Crowley can smell it, all too well. 

“Yes,” Crowley says, through clenched teeth. He’s doing his best to stay still, not to shy away. It’s the smells that are really the worst part—the blood and waste and bile, the smell of smoke and rot and despair—and they’re all over Aziraphale and— “I’m here, but the question is, what the bloody fuck are you doing here? How long have you _been_ here? That baker said you came through two _months_ ago. Have you gone completely out of your head, letting someone _see_ you come in here—

Aziraphale winces. “Yes, well, I can assure you, it was hardly intentional—”

Crowley makes some unformed mouth noises. “Oh, sure, all right, but now here you are, and—” He doesn’t mean to be getting so worked up. Disease isn’t a problem for the two of them, personally; _‘s like oil and water,_ Crowley once slurred, a couple of millennia ago. ( _Setu_ -fever, in Egypt.) They can’t catch it, can’t even transfer it, certainly can’t get sick from it. (Though Aziraphale looks so dreadful….) It’s not like he hasn’t seen this before, plenty of times, it’s just—

“I just—I was sent—”

“What do you mean you were _sssent_ ,” Crowley hisses, cutting him off. He can’t have—he _wouldn’t,_ but— “Aziraphale,” Crowley bites out, his tongue sizzling a bit, “did they—did you _bring the black death here?”_

The angel flinches back, looking truly hurt. “No! I didn’t—I wouldn’t—”

Instant regret chews at Crowley’s stomach.

In a very small voice, Aziraphale says, “Do you really think that of me, dear?”

The chewing becomes a fierce tearing. “No, angel, no, I—I’m sorry, I just—” Aziraphale still looks a bit broken, and Crowley looks away, shoving his hands into his coat pockets. “I really hated the fourteenth century, you know,” he mutters, an admission.

Aziraphale’s face clears into comprehension. “Oh.”

Echh, as if Crowley needs the humiliation. But it’s too late, he’s obviously remembering: remembering the summer of 1349, remembering the time he’d come across Crowley, sniveling drunk in an alehouse in Oxford. Crowley had stumbled there to tempt a student at one of the colleges, but he’d taken a little detour, to the bar, because he’d just come from a little hamlet near London. He’d been supposed to see a miller’s wife there, tempt her to gossip or something, but by the time he arrived, three quarters of the village was dead of plague, and there was no one much left to gossip or to gossip about. It had been the _fourth time_ something similar had happened that summer—the plague traveled even faster than Hell’s assignments—and Crowley was—well. Crowley needed a bloody drink.

After he had pathetically blathered the whole story over his cups, Aziraphale had ushered him to a room upstairs and told him to sleep. “I’ll take care of it, dear,” Crowley seemed to remember him saying as he tucked Crowley into bed. It had been the first time Aziraphale had ever volunteered first to do anything along the lines of their Arrangement, if he recalled correctly.

Aziraphale is looking at him a bit like that again now, and Crowley isn’t having it, even if his hands _do_ want to shake again. He clears his throat. “So then why are you—?”

“Ah,” Aziraphale looks away in his turn. “I was sent to Stoney Middleton for a blessing on a smith’s apprentice...” He trails off.

“And?”

“And I heard what was happening, here in Eyam.” He reaches up to rub his face, but catches himself. There are strips of cloth wrapped around his palms. “They did it themselves,” he says, quietly. “The quarantine. I didn’t give them the idea. When I got here… it’s been almost a full year now, since the plague broke out—and it’s not really divine policy lately to inflict these things, you know.” Crowley arches an eyebrow, but doesn’t interrupt. “Not usually. There was a parcel of cloth from London, I believe, but—“ Aziraphale shakes his head and continues. “They agreed here, together, to quarantine themselves, in June, to try to spare the neighboring villages, it’s… And if I left, now that they knew I was here, it would spoil everything. It’s hard enough on them, when the right thing to do is, is to hold back, to not act. To stay, not to leave. They’d think it was all in vain, they might—and—” He makes an aborted, frustrated gesture. “And I… I couldn’t just _leave_ them. They… they’re _trying.”_ He says it like pleading.

“So what are you doing here? Healings?”

Aziraphale says, stiffly, “I got a preemptive notice that ‘under no circumstances are plague victims to be miraculously interfered with without specific, detailed instruction.’ So I can’t... But I—I didn’t want to be called away, you see. So I’ve been lying low, as they say.”

“How low, exactly,” Crowley says, flatly. He looks him up and down, suspiciously: the state of his clothes, the strange exhaustion.... “Angel, haven’t you been doing any miracles at _all?”_ Crowley’s never heard of such a thing.

“That wouldn’t be lying low, would it,” Aziraphale sniffs, raising his chin. Oh heaven, Crowley thinks: it’s the _digging-in-my-heels_ look. Combined with pursing his lips and glancing away—that’s _pretending-everything-is-perfectly-normal_ but _knowing-full-well-I’m-being-odd,_ that is. The last time Crowley saw this look was when Aziraphale had decided to try beekeeping (for mead-making purposes, of course) _entirely the human way,_ but also all on his own, without proper research. (Admittedly, that was in the days pre-books.) That had ended about as well as could be expected, honestly.

So. No miracles. No wonder he’s a mess. Well… but he really is excessively filthy right now.

“Why are you so filthy?” Crowley asks, slowly.

“I was—digging. A grave—well, graves—for Mistress Elizabeth Hancock.” He closes his eyes. “Widow Hancock, now,” he says, softly. There’s a moment of almost silence. A thrush calls from outside, but no wailing, not just now. “Her husband John and, and two more of her children died this afternoon.”

Crowley winces.

“Families have to bury their own dead, you see, and…” He clears his throat. “I just thought she had enough to be going on with, today.”

Crowley nods, stiffly. He should say something. _(Idiot. You’re a demon, what could you possibly say?)_ He could say, _sounds, uh, rough._ He could say, _You and I both know there are worse things than death._ He could say, _well, you know mortals. They all die eventually._ (Sometimes he chants it to himself, over and over, though it never really helps.) But he doesn’t want to see the look he knows Aziraphale will give him. “Grave-digging,” he finally gets out. “I guess that explains why you’re all over mud.”

“Well, someone has to,” Aziraphale says with a touch of defensiveness, chin going up again. Then he seems to subside. “But not mostly. There’s the tending of the sick, though there’s not much to be done without…” His hands work at his sides for a moment. “Washing, making people comfortable, dressing sores. Sometimes I collect feverfew, or betony, or willow bark, for Mistress Wood, she makes medicines from them.” He shifts, looking down at the floor and holding his elbows gingerly, and says, low, almost guiltily, “Sometimes bodies are so… so awful.”

Then he rushes on, like he can’t quite make himself stop talking. “Or I sing, or tell stories, to the children—the adults too, really. Things get frightfully dull, even amid... well.” He shakes his head, as if he can wriggle away from _amid_. “Do you know, Crowley, last week I told them the story of Gilgamesh and Enkidu and the serpent’s riddles—remember that? I remembered you telling it to those children in Akkad, and I think I got all the riddles right—Willie Hancock laughed just the same way little Naram-adad did, back when you told it...“ He falters.

“Angel…” Crowley‘s throat refuses to swallow properly.

Aziraphale sways a bit, then lifts his head. “But uh, at least I know how to use a well, now.” He’s trying to sound light, blithesome, but his voice creaks.

It feels—like it has a thousand times before, a thousand thousand. Any moment, Aziraphale will straighten up, put on a flat, cheery smile, spout some party line about ineffability, and—withdraw. Maybe not physically, but… he’ll be gone. Too distant to reach. Crowley won’t be able to tell what he’s thinking, and he certainly won’t _say_ it, and he’ll probably head out again with that quiet bull-headedness. His face shows so bloody much, but that doesn’t mean Crowley can _understand_....

Aziraphale sways a little on his feet. Then it’s not just a little, it’s a lot; he’s listing alarmingly to one side, and Crowley steps forward without thinking to catch him before he outright falls down.

And Aziraphale flinches away, almost violently, leaving Crowley blinking at him, one hand raised empty in the air.

“Oh,” Aziraphale says, immediately contrite. “Oh no, I’m—I didn’t mean….” He takes a small step closer. “I’m sorry. Habit, you know. I don’t normally let anyone who’s still on their feet get that close.” He grimaces, spreads his hands. “Contagion.”

Crowley cocks his head, narrowing his eyes. “Angel, you do know we can’t spread it?”

“I know, I—I do,” Aziraphale says. Starts to wring his hands, stops abruptly. “But _they_ don’t know that, and I’ve been trying to set the example, you see, and—” He closes his eyes, and satan’s sake, there’s that swaying again. “I _am_ sorry, dear. I feel a bit—a bit odd lately, and…”

“Aziraphale,” Crowley says, because he needs the emphasis. It’s not so very painful, not much worse than scalding his tongue on soup. _“Sit down.”_

And he does it, no arguing for once, just lowers himself slowly onto one of the rush-bottomed stools by the window. The light from the first quarter moon is rather dim, but more than enough for Crowley’s serpent eyes to see him rub at his eyes with the back of his hand. Why does he have those wrappings…

One thing at a time. Crowley kneels on the flagstone, magics up a basin of hot water, and a steaming pitcher with more; a stack of soft cloths, a cake of soap that smells of lavender. He starts loosening the angel’s sandals, confident-like, like he isn’t afraid that Aziraphale will jerk away from him.

“Crowley?” The tremulous tone of it makes Crowley pause.

He looks up, over his dark glasses, then takes a moment to remove them and slip them into a coat pocket. He meets the angel’s gaze, those blue-grey eyes rather wider than usual and washed pale in the faint moonlight, staring down. “Let me?” Crowley asks, as softly as he can.

Of course it’s a question; it’s not like he’s going to coerce him into this, even if he could, which—well, _angel_ , it’s laughable, really. Regardless, Crowley tries to let it be neutral. It _is_ neutral, it doesn’t matter how much he wants to do it, how much he—so much that—anyway, nobody needs to know that, not the angel, and not himself either, so just don’t—

Aziraphale blinks rapidly, then nods.

Okay. Good. Well then. Crowley’s not fool enough to suggest an entire bath, but he can do this, at least. It feels somehow necessary that he do it this way, human and slow, easing Aziraphale’s scraped bare feet into the hot water, hearing him sigh. “Let that soak a minute,” he says, looking up. “Now, what have you done to your hands?”

“I—”

“Don’t say ‘nothing,’ just—” He reaches, and Aziraphale doesn’t stop him, so Crowley picks up one from his knee, unwinds the linen wrapping.

“Crowley, don’t—make a fuss,” Aziraphale says, weakly. Crowley says nothing, but he has gone very still.

The angel’s right hand has dirt and dust ground into the lines and creases, and the joints and tissue look stiff and swollen from unaccustomed rough use. Long, raised blisters from the handle of the shovel stripe his palm and the pads of his fingers. Only some of them have burst. Aziraphale’s soft, grimy fingers twitch just slightly; the band of the ring on his pinky glints, dully gold.

Crowley feels—he doesn’t know what he feels, exactly. He’s grinding his teeth, and his eyes feel hot, and— Without thinking, without any idea of what kind of excuse he’ll use if Hell gets wind of this, he hovers his own palm the merest hairs-breadth distance over Aziraphale’s, so close he can feel the warmth between them like a breath, and slowly draws it across, over the palm, over the fingers, healing it completely.

 _“Oh,”_ says Aziraphale: a tiny, wet gulp of utter relief. Crowley doesn’t look up, just takes his other hand and does the same, but slower, because this one has splinters as well as weeping sores, and he has to concentrate.

He finishes at last, and releases the angel’s hands, still watching them intently for any sign of discomfort as Aziraphale flexes his fingers with a shivering sigh, and takes a breath as if to speak.

“That’s long enough on these,” Crowley interrupts, brusquely, still not looking up, and lifts one of Aziraphale’s feet out of the cloudy water, up to the lip of the basin. He flips back the cuffs of his shirt sleeves, and picks up the soap and a cloth.

Aziraphale’s voice is nervous, and tired, and very soft. Fraying at the edges, like the hem of his robe. “You really don’t have to—”

“Shut it already,” Crowley grumbles, far too gently, and begins washing his angel’s feet. 

It’s a task, all right. Not like he’s an expert—it’s been ages since they lived anywhere this was traditional, commonplace. There’s mud splattered and dried all the way up onto his rounded calves, so Crowley uses a wet cloth on that, flattening the hair and following the water trailing down to his solid ankles.

The grime is stubborn—stripes of leather dye sweated onto the top of the foot, dirt ground into the calluses—and Crowley mutters under his breath about a scrub brush. Better to do it gradually though. He pours more hot water in, rinsing, breathing in the heat and lavender scent. He eases the first foot back down, raises the other, repeats the process.

Out of the corner of his eye, Crowley can see the angel’s hands open and close, gathering the fabric of his robe up out of Crowley’s way, once, twice, then gradually relax. Nodding a bit as he works, Crowley tries to think about what else is needful here.

His own feet would be killing him after walking all that way today, if he couldn’t just magic it away, he thinks. He pushes the basin back a little, lays down a large towel for cushioning, and ushers the angel’s feet, still wet, out of the water and onto the fabric.

Next, he takes Aziraphale’s ankle in hand again, dries his foot carefully, and props it up on his lap, a folded cloth beneath. Crowley works his thumbs into the ball of the foot, squeezes steadily around the heel. Thinks for a moment, then focuses a small jar of thick liniment into existence at his side. He scoops out a generous dollop and starts working it into the sole of the angel’s foot.

“Oh,” Aziraphale says, unsteadily, “uh, what is that, then?”

Crowley grunts and pauses, sniffing the ends of his fingers briefly. “Mostly wool grease and beeswax,” he says, resuming. “Some garden mint.”

“It’s very—effective.” Crowley can see his soft hands squeeze in the fabric of his robe again. “And my hands do feel ever so much better, dear, it’s quite a relief—“ His voice catches, and Crowley shakes his head and doesn’t look up. Even without looking, he’s pretty sure the angel is blotting at his eyes.

“Hm,” says Crowley, quellingly. Normally he quite enjoys hearing Aziraphale talk, but not if he’s going to _thank_ him or anything inappropriate like that. At least maybe they can put that off till later. He puts the first foot to the side, resting on a cloth, and begins drying the other.

Distantly, he notes that, plausibly deniable tears or no, he no longer feels the vibration of Aziraphale’s distress, not since just after Aziraphale first came into the cottage. Crowley doesn’t understand at _all._

Crowley’s in no hurry to finish here—it’s quiet, and he likes... feeling useful, having a straightforward task to perform. He shouldn’t draw things out though, he supposes, so he reaches for the jar by his side, applies more of the cream. Aziraphale’s toes seem funny and delicate, an oddly shaped nail on the littlest one.

He tries not to think too much, tries to just quietly enjoy the moment: the texture of Aziraphale’s clean skin, the warmth of it, the slide of his fingers over the arch of the foot, the way Aziraphale sighs softly.

Crowley looks up. Aziraphale’s eyes are closed, and his face softer, less drawn, but still thoroughly smudged with dirt. Oh, right. Crowley concentrates, and then Aziraphale catches his breath and shivers. His clothes should all be clean, and most of his body, though Crowley can’t vouch completely for his hair or various other spots—it was a basic cleaning miracle, not something more thorough, or invasive. He is _trying_ not to be completely creepy, demon or no.

“Oh, lovely,” Aziraphale sighs, impulsively, then seems to realize something. “Why… You could have done that before.”

Crowley shrugs, returns his attention to finishing rubbing in the liniment beneath Aziraphale’s toes. “How else was I supposed to get you to sit down and hold still for ten minutes together?”

Aziraphale makes a _hmph-_ ing noise, and twitches. “Ticklish.”

“Sorry.” Crowley sets his foot down, slowly. All finished now, he supposes. He flicks his hand, banishing the cleaning supplies, except for a few of the cloths.

“No, I… I appreciate it.” Aziraphale stirs a little, and says, faster than Crowley can object to, “And thank you, I feel ever so much better, for being clean. You’re right though, I should probably go back out now, and—”

As if Crowley was hinting? This is what an impending migraine must feel like, to humans, it must be. He leans back on his heels, rubs at his temples. “Angel, when did I say that?”

“Oh. I suppose you didn’t. Still, I should—“

“I’m saying the opposite, angel. I think you should stay here and rest.”

“Well, I mean, I don’t actually need sleep, and—”

Crowley tsks, forcefully. “Under normal circumstances, maybe. Don’t be an idiot. If you’re _really_ lying low—” heaven, if he’s really not using any miracles at all, who knows what might happen? Crowley wonders if the constant use of grace—or... damnation? in his case—is part of what maintains their corporeal forms. After all what else does? Not breath, not even a heart beat—those are present, habitual, but not necessary…. (Even under normal conditions, it’s possible to tap out one’s un-, sub- or super-natural powers; Crowley should know, he’s been working recently on a time-pausing trick that, frankly, leaves him absolutely knackered.)

Before he can say any of that, Aziraphale stands. “The circumstances shouldn’t matter,” he declares, firmly. “It’s a question of duty.”

“Oh, sure, duty,” Crowley scoffs. He really hates that declaration voice, for so many reasons. For a moment, as he scrambles to his own feet, Crowley feels keenly aware of how small the room really is, of how there’s an _angel_ between him and the door. He feels rumpled, dusty knees, ribbon on his breeches askew. Somehow, he’s clutching the straps of Aziraphale’s sandals, though he doesn’t recall picking them up.

Aziraphale’s words are as stiff as his back, as his stupid neck. “It _should_ be my duty, as an angel of God, and… and…” He’s twisting that ring, around and around.

A frustrated Crowley is not a Crowley who always thinks before he leaps. Or acts. Or speaks. “Precious duty,” he sneers. “What are you even doing? And why are you alone here, exactly?”

Aziraphale flinches.

And Crowley has never met a hole he couldn’t dig just a little deeper, has he. “Well, alone, except for _me_.” He bares his teeth, bitterly. He wishes he was still wearing his glasses, but no, no, it’s better this way. Jaundice-yellow irises gleaming.

Aziraphale blinks at him. “Yes.” Crowley doesn’t know what his expression means, but he stares, surly, until the angel looks away at last. “I should press on, not be lazy. Sloth, that’s your—” He clears his throat. “It’s a temptation.”

“Ahh, so I must be here to tempt you, then,” Crowley snaps. “Distract you, stop you from helping— ‘Do you really think that of me, _dear?’”_ Ah fuck. He means it to come out scathing and ironic, but his voice breaks halfway through.

“Of course not, Crowley, I didn’t mean…” Aziraphale’s voice is unbearable—Crowley refuses to bear it. He turns away, which in this case means towards the hearth stones, because the room really is tiny.

“Whatever. Do what you want,” he says, tossing the sandals at the angel’s feet. He waits, shoulders tight, for the sound of straps being tied, for the door to open. It doesn’t.

Behind him, finally, Aziraphale mutters, “It’s… a question of, of knowing better—”

Crowley spins back around. “Because what,” he spits, “m’jussst a demon, got no morals, no sssense of decency—” It’s stupid of him to be reacting like this. He’s a _demon_ , it’s part of the _definition—_

 _“No,_ that’s not it, _”_ Aziraphale hisses back. “It’s not—” He puts both hands over his face. Whispers, almost inaudibly: “it’s not you who should know better.”

Crowley stops. _Oh,_ he thinks. Aziraphale doesn’t mean himself either, or not entirely; he means... _Oh._

Aziraphale takes a step, two—short and heavy, then turns and sits on the edge of the low bed. His head is in his hands, his elbows on his knees. He’s… shaking?

 _God,_ Crowley thinks, very softly, _I didn’t actually mean to make things worse._ (Just one more damning admission. Isn’t it supposed to be his job to make things worse?)

When Aziraphale’s voice comes, it’s so quiet, but it still sounds somehow like it’s been trampled by a damned horse. “It’s not my place to...” He swallows. “It’s not up to me, is it. Before I came, Gabriel asked if I could handle it, if I could, could follow orders, restrain myself, not like back in the fourteenth century…”

He pauses for long enough that Crowley asks softly, “What did you do? Then?”

Aziraphale gestures vaguely with one newly-healed hand ( _ah,_ thinks Crowley) and doesn’t look up. “They say it’s part of the plan, we can’t just do everything for them, and that’s… that’s true. So I—I said I could. But then I got here, and… if I… but then….” He clears his throat. “I know what I’m doing isn’t… it isn’t enough, it isn’t even all I can do, I could… but. If I did. Then they…”

Crowley says nothing. Nothing to say. ‘What can they do.’ How should he know, he hasn’t been Up There for aeons, he doesn’t know the current policy. They probably don’t use the rack or whatever. But he’s standing right here. _Fallen._ Living object lesson, he is—’if you can’t be a good example, you’ll have to be a terrible warning.’ That’s him, all right.

“At the least,” Aziraphale says, into his lap, “then they’d send me away. They already… I just got a new assignment, an hour ago, and I—I don’t know what to do.”

Crowley refrains from sighing. This, at least, has an obvious solution. Clearly, Aziraphale is too tired to think straight. “What is it?”

“What?”

“The new assignment. What is it?”

Aziraphale runs his hands through his hair. “Series of revelatory dreams, in Cornwall,” he says, scrubbing at his face. “A week’s worth, or more, and I—”

Crowley leans, slides a shilling out of his pocket. “All right then, toss you.” He flips the coin high, catches it deftly in mid-air. “Hm, oh look,” he says, casually, not looking at all, “heads it is.” Tucks it away. “Cornwall for me, then.”

Aziraphale makes a sort of choked sound and puts his hands over his face again.

The lack of protestation is not actually setting Crowley’s mind at ease. Gingerly, he sits next to him, carefully not touching. “Angel, you’re shaking. When did you last eat something?” Not that the two things should be related, but then, he himself often finds breathing to be calming when it really shouldn’t make a difference.

Aziraphale shrugs. “I don’t need to eat.”

This really is the absolute limit. “Now I think you’re just having me on,” he gripes, and pokes the angel’s shoulder with one finger. “Who are you, and why do you look so much like Aziraphale?” (Tongue’s already singed, what’s one more time.)

Aziraphale rolls his eyes, says fondly, “Fiend.”

Crowley could never mistake that voice, has never mistaken it, not in five thousand years. “But you love food.”

“I don’t need—”

“There’s more than just physical needs you know, angel.” Crowley recalls, reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out the roll the baker gave him earlier, sparing a quick snap to fluff and warm it. “Here.”

Aziraphale pauses, then reaches out and takes it. He turns it over in his hands, crusty brown, and breaks it open, revealing the soft, pale crumb inside. It smells good, even to a demon.

“You’re making it worse,” Aziraphale says, softly.

“Am I.” _Making what worse?_ He knows what. Probably knows.

“Samaritan,” mutters Aziraphale, vaguely, and now Crowley’s at a loss, to be honest. But at least the angel is eating, tearing off small chunks of bread and putting them in his mouth, chewing slowly.

He passes one to Crowley, and Crowley doesn’t bother waving him off. The bread is warm and a little sweet.

Aziraphale is just finishing, brushing crumbs off the skirt of his robe, and Crowley decides to see if he can press his luck here, just a little.

Tentatively, he puts a hand on Aziraphale’s arm. Not really a whole hand. Just his long fingers, just the ends of them. Lightly. Easy to pull back if Aziraphale flinches or raises an eyebrow or—

He doesn’t. He stills. And then he leans, just a little, into the touch.

Crowley doesn’t know why it makes his throat catch. He swallows and speaks. “You should lie down. For a while. What if you overtax this body and end up discorporating somehow?” Aziraphale makes a face. “Yeah, exactly.”

“I don’t think that’s likely, surely,” Aziraphale says, but he doesn’t sound very sure.

It occurs to Crowley that he hasn’t actually verbalized his thought process. He takes a breath, scrapes some words together. “Angel, what do our corporations really run on? Not blood and breath, or food. What if it’s miracles? If you’ve sworn off them... who knows what might happen? What if you get sick, or hurt?” More hurt, Crowley thinks, and grits his teeth again.

Aziraphale looks up, and Crowley wants to touch his face so badly that it’s like a pain in his chest, an ache in the bones of his fingers. “If you could see the circles under your eyes,” he says, gruffly, instead, and watches Aziraphale’s fingers go up to his face. “How long since you rested, angel? Not slept—” he heads off the argument he can see in Aziraphale’s contrary eyes, “just rested?” He takes the squinch of Aziraphale’s mouth as the answer that it is. “Right. Just lie _down_.”

Aziraphale frowns down at his lap. He hasn’t moved away from Crowley’s hand, still leaning in, and against Crowley’s leg too, like a big farm dog. (Crowley heard they’re blaming dogs and cats for the sickness, in London. Killing them, poor little buggers. Christ, Crowley _fucking hates_ the plague.)

The angel stirs, says at last, slowly, “I don’t want to sleep.” Whispers. “What if I dream.”

Do angels dream? (No more than they dance?) Crowley would like to promise him that he won’t, but that would be a lie. After all, he himself does.

So instead he says, “I’ll stay with you.”

Echh, why did he say that? It’s not like it can help, not like it means anything. But the angel’s face— “Oh, would you? Really?” he says, and ugh, his _face,_ the way it lightens, like a lamp lighting, like a burden falling.

“Yeah,” Crowley says. _I can sit on the hearth,_ he thinks, glancing, because he’s trying not to think about what else he would do to keep Aziraphale’s expression glowing like this.

He must read the direction of Crowley’s gaze, because he says, “Oh no, that won’t do, it’s hardly fair to relegate you to cold stone when you’re doing me a—” Crowley shoots him a look, and he stops short of slanderous terms. “We could share the bed?”

Crowley’s mouth opens, which is foolish really, because he has no idea what he intends to say. What comes out is a vaguely inquisitive, vaguely squelchy sound, like a desert rain frog might make when faced unexpectedly with the Everglades.

Aziraphale’s face is turning desperately pink. “Forgive me, dear, I’m really so discombobulated, I didn’t mean to suggest anything untoward, I… that is to say, I shouldn’t ask, you’ve done so much already—”

“Angel.” Crowley’s voice croak-squeaks, much like the aforementioned frog, and he takes a moment to look away and swallow. He says, very quietly, “I like it when you ask.”

There’s an interminable pause, in which Crowley continues to stare at the yawning mouth of the hearth and considers the wisdom-versus-probability ratio of never opening his fool mouth again. “Oh, Crowley,” Aziraphale says, at last, equally quietly, and does he really _have_ to say it like _that?_ And also what does saying it _like that_ really mean, except then Aziraphale leans into Crowley’s side, turns and presses his face into Crowley’s shoulder. Then, muffled, he says, “In that case uh… if it’s not too—would you please just—“

“Angel?”

“Hold me,” Aziraphale mumbles.

“What?”

“While I—” Aziraphale shifts, but not away—just so that his face is free and staring downward. “I don’t want to feel alone,” he says, so quietly.

“Ah,” says Crowley, through that tight throat again. “Yeah, alright,” he tries, and shrugs. He thinks he does a decent impression of a demon who is not stricken to the core by the way this angel’s face is gently beaming.

Or by the thought of cuddling up to this insufferable embodiment of sunshine.

Shit, shit, shit.

He wasn’t prepared for this.

Ready or not.

Aziraphale leans into him again, then straightens and reaches up, lifts off his hood and mantle, then picks at the knot in his belt. His nails are a little ragged; Crowley should have used that lotion on his hands while he had the chance—

For one wild moment, Crowley has a vivid sense-memory of the Garden, the Wall: the smell of apples, of hot air off the desert, of wet feathers above his head. For just a moment, he imagines the touch of those soft, strong hands on his bare skin, imagines touching back—

 _Stop._ Crowley wrenches his gaze away. This isn’t—that, and Crowley is…. He’s not going to let Aziraphale down. He won’t.

He stands up, considers. It feels rude to just gesture his clothes into changing like he normally would, so he unbuttons his coat and shrugs it off, lays it over the nearest stool. He takes off his belt, his shoes, and his boothose, is left standing in his shirt and breeches and dark red stockings. Glances over, wondering if it’s too much, or not enough.

Aziraphale has triumphed over the knot at last, and the rope belt coils unevenly by the foot of the pallet. The angel himself is already lying on his side, face practically pressed against the wall.

(His back out. Clothed, but still—exposed. To a demon. For a moment, Crowley feels dizzy, before he shakes himself, sternly.)

It’s rather a narrow bed, but Crowley can already tell Aziraphale is fretting about leaving him enough space.

Good thing holding is the plan, there’s not a lot of alternative here, Crowley thinks, weakly. He’s vaguely proud of himself for not saying it aloud. No need to make things more awkward than they already are.

Crowley slides onto the bed (awkwardly) then lies down (so awkwardly) and scoots closer (the awkwardest). Limbs are stupid, and he’s never been so tempted to shift into serpent form, not ever, not even during the Unfortunate Hangover Incident of 438.

Holding requires arms though, usually, so it’s just as well.

Holding.

Crowley takes a deep breath. He folds his lower arm under his head, trying not to catch his own loose-hanging curls (ugh, his elbow might as well be a dagger), and then, slowly, carefully, slides his left arm over Aziraphale’s waist.

There. The world didn’t end, did it.

Aziraphale’s bulk seems less alarmingly diminished from this close. The curve of his belly is soft under Crowley’s wrist.

He’s far too stiff though; there’s no way this is restful.

Also, Crowley’s elbow has not gotten any less pointy.

“Uh, how’s the decade been treating you?” Aziraphale asks, awkwardly of course. “Terribly rude of me not to ask earlier.”

Crowley snorts a bit. “Are we doing small talk now, angel? Really?” He can’t keep the fondness out of his tone. “Small talk’s one of ours, must be.”

Aziraphale takes a breath and for a moment Crowley thinks he’s going to call the whole thing off, which… whatever he wants. But it seems a shame to waste the time and mortification they’ve already put in here.

But instead, Aziraphale laughs softly and says, “I suppose so. And you and I are well past that, surely.”

“Too right,” Crowley says. “Lift your head?” Aziraphale does, and Crowley straightens his arm, slides it underneath the angel’s neck. “This okay?”

Aziraphale nods, and his fluffy hair tickles Crowley’s nose. Heaven and Hell, it’s so soft. Crowley always thought it would be soft.

 _Stop,_ he snaps at himself. He swallows, then swallows again. And again.

Aziraphale wiggles a bit—the pallet is rather lumpy, hardly what you’d call comfortable—pressing backwards into Crowley’s front and then laughs a little. “Like spoons in a drawer, aren’t we?” he asks, and he sounds delighted at the thought, the turn of phrase.

“Mmhmm,” Crowley manages. Aziraphale is warm and close and cozy and it’s absolutely maddening.

 _(What did I ever do to deserve this,_ Crowley wants to demand of someone. He doesn’t know if he wants to demand it furiously or gratefully.)

The angel stills suddenly. ”I’m sorry to be so restless. And chattery. You probably want to actually sleep.”

“Might do, eventually,” Crowley allows. “No worries.” The habit is pretty strong, but then again, there’s this proximity to consider. His stomach’s all creepy-crawlies right now, which is absurd, but—

“The thing is,” Aziraphale admits, “I don’t really know _how_ to sleep. You’re the expert here.” There’s a little smile in his voice. “Perhaps I should be asking you for advice.”

He’s already more relaxed. Crowley can feel his breathing slowing a little, his ribs expanding and contracting. Crowley lets his arm hang a little heavier over them, lets his fingers curl in more easily, feels the brush of linen rising and falling. He can bear this, surely.

“Thought better of your no-sleeping plan, then?”

“Well, we’ll see. Depends on your pointers.”

Needless to say, Crowley has never tried to teach sleeping to anyone. Humans do it automatically, most of the time. Currently, though…. “Well… tell me how you feel, right now. Your corporation, I mean.”

“A bit strange.”

“You said it’s been odd, right?”

“Yes, for a while now.”

“That’s probably the fatigue, gotten out of hand. Focus on it.”

“Oh, how odd,” Aziraphale says, his tone curious. “It’s a sort of resistance, as if I’m moving through water?”

“Sure, yeah. That’s it.”

“Do you often feel this? Tired?”

“Yeah,” he says. “I can shake it off, of course, but… you’re accustomed to eating regularly, right? Same here, but for sleep. Takes some effort to get rid of it, sometimes it’s easier to just… let it happen.”

Aziraphale hums pensively. Crowley can feel it, the vibration, before he falls silent. It’s fine, really. It’s just so close and quiet, intimate, a sensation he’d never have been able to feel this way before, and… this is a normal amount of swallowing, right?

“Oh!” Aziraphale says suddenly. “Oh, that’s very strange.”

“What?”

“Like my brain was slipping, down a channel in stone... remember those freshwater pools near Mount Gilboa?”

Crowley nods. That was a while back. “Yeah,” he says, “sometimes it feels a bit like sliding down somewhere. Really,” it suddenly occurs to him, “it’s a bit like being drunk. Sort of. More fragile though, till you’re truly asleep.”

“How curious,” the angel muses. “I’m not sure I’ll be able to manage it.”

“Well, give it a bit,” Crowley says. “Even the humans have trouble with it sometimes.”

Aziraphale nods, though a bit doubtfully.

He’s quiet for a while. Crowley tries to breathe steadily. He feels a little strange himself, but it’s not exhaustion, or (just) lust. He tries his best to ignore it, whatever it is.

When Aziraphale next speaks, it’s gently. “I’m sorry you had to come, dear, I know how much you hate the plague.”

He’s not wrong, but they don’t have to get into it. Crowley shrugs. “I’ll be off to Cornwall in the morning.”

He meant it to change the subject, but Aziraphale is incorrigible. “I don’t suppose you’ll accept my th-”

“No, nope, don’t get soppy on me now, angel.” They’ve had this conversation before. It’s bloody unfair of him to try to bring it up now, when Crowley is a captive audience. Of sorts.

“Still, you didn’t have to come all this—” Aziraphale breaks off abruptly. After a pause, he says, “Crowley,” in a cautiously blank tone. Uh oh. Crowley should’ve thought how this could look… he tries to think of something to deflect, but— “Crowley, how _did_ you know to come here? How did you know I was here?”

“Uh.” Crowley stalls out of habit, and poorly. “The baker woman, in whatsit?”

It’s true, technically, but it must be very unconvincing, because Aziraphale turns onto his back and half-sits up, saying, “Hm. And you were there, because?”

He backs up, reflexively, pushes up on one elbow himself. Aziraphale is looking at him, not accusingly but definitely with an eyebrow raised. Crowley could keep making excuses but it seems foolish, after all this. He doesn’t want to revert, to… be the one to withdraw. Not tonight.

Also, Aziraphale is the cleverest person he knows, so if there are any answers to be found…. Slowly, he asks, “…what happened here, today? About 3 o’clock this afternoon?”

Aziraphale is silent for a moment. “Willie Hancock died,” he says at last, and his voice—it’s hollowed out with sorrow.

 _Ah, angel,_ Crowley thinks. What he says is, “Hm.”

“Why? What does that have to do with—”

Crowley braces himself. So much for not being creepy? Not like this weirdness is his idea. Better to just lay it out…

“Sometimes,” he says, slowly, because laying it all out is terrible, “sometimes I can—tell. When you’re—distressed. About something.”

“What?”

Crowley might be sleeping on cold stone tonight anyway. Maybe he should be, anyway. He flops down on his back on the free strip of bed, and covers his eyes with his palm. “It’s a sort of beacon? I don’t know why it happens, I swear, angel, I—”

“Dear. Please calm down and tell me what you’re talking about.”

“I don’t know, I don’t know what it is. It started ages ago, but—it’s only got stronger, over the years. Used to be only emergencies.”

“Emergencies?”

“Yeah, like—like Lindisfarne.”

“Oh… oh! Is that why you—”

“Yeah, that time it practically dragged me there by the scruff of the neck. But this time it was just... grinding away, sort of an undertone, and I... I wanted to check. Maybe I shouldn’t have... Anyway. I knew something happened this afternoon because I felt it. This—spike, in your distress. It made me want to—it felt _bad_ , like something bad had happened. And turns out it had.”

“So you’re… feeling my emotions?” Aziraphale’s voice goes a little squeaky, and Crowley grimaces.

“No! Well, yes, a bit. I don’t mean to. It’s just... like a vibration in my head. Like a millstone, rumbling.”

“That loud? All the time?”

“Not all the time. But sometimes. Or it’s a beehive droning, or a cat purring... And sometimes I can... home in on it. Tell where it’s coming from. Approximately.”

“And it’s not... is it just me?”

“Yeah.” Crowley winces, considering. “Thank satan, yeah. Can you imagine if this happened every time some insufferable archangel got pissed about dirt on his hose or, or Dagon went off on a tear because of late paperwork?” At least then maybe he’d know where to avoid, but blech.

He chances a glance over towards the angel, who is still leaning back, but chewing meditatively on the edge of his lip, lost in thought. Crowley looks away. He’s pretty sure he’s not about to get smited; that’s not even what he’s afraid of, he realizes, slowly. And if it’s not that, then…

“…the question is, why inconsistently. And what’s the _mechanism?_ ” Aziraphale is saying, as if to himself.

Crowley is normally fascinated by _mechanisms,_ but right now his stomach is tight with—something. He shrugs. “I don’t understand how it works.”

“Do you feel it now?”

Crowley checks in, carefully, but: “No, not now.” Stillness in that channel, behind his eyes, his ears.

“I’ve felt... distressed several times this evening, what about—”

“No, no, not then either. Not since you—” he waves back toward the door.

“Hmm.” For just a moment, Aziraphale’s forehead creases, and Crowley can sense his cheeks warming, and Crowley thinks maybe he— But then he shakes his head, expression nothing but puzzlement. “Well. That’s certainly very strange.”

“Is that really all you have to say about it?”

“I’m thinking, Crowley.”

It’s all he can do not to writhe like a snake. Echh, Crowley shouldn’t have come here. It’s not an emergency (though how was he to know that, he doesn’t know anything, but still), and he— He closes his eyes and mutters, “I swear I didn’t mean to be creepy.”

“Oh.” He feels a hand on his upper arm. “Dear, please—I believe you.”

Crowley peeks, just barely. The tension in his stomach eases. “Yeah?”

Aziraphale smiles. “Of course.” And then he turns onto his side again, wriggles down. Waits a moment and then raises his head, expectantly, looking back over his shoulder as if to say, well?

“Oh. Well. Good, then,” Crowley manages, and slowly turns, scoots back into position, curled up around the angel.

“Whatever this is, we’ll figure it out. Not now, because—my thoughts are not as sharp as they might be, at present,” Aziraphale says, begrudgingly. “But we will.”

“Yeah, alright,” says Crowley, which he thinks is very articulate of him, considering every bit of his skin feels like it’s tingling.

“There’s surely some explanation. Besides, I don’t want you _dragged_ anywhere just because I’m being—inconvenienced,” he continues.

 _I don’t mind,_ Crowley manages not to say. “Don’t let the Vikings hear you call them an inconvenience,” he says.

Aziraphale snorts. “Raiding has been quite out of fashion in Scandinavia for well over three hundred years, dear, I’m hardly worried. Also, we’re nearly a hundred miles from the sea, I doubt they’d come all this way just to defend their honor, even back then.”

 _All this way._ Wait a minute. Crowley’s mind makes a sudden leap.

“Angel. Did you really not intend to come in here?” Crowley asks. He’s pretty sure they’d have set up a cordon to prevent accidental wanderers, as part of the quarantine, at least early on.

Aziraphale is quiet for a long, incriminating minute.

“Oh, angel.”

“I have a very poor sense of direction at times,” Aziraphale says, primly. “I may have got disoriented.” While Crowley works up a proper splutter, he continues, “And now that I’m here, I’m really just obeying the established regulations by staying.”

Crowley huffs in exasperation and delight. “So that’s your story?”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” he replies, serenely.

 _I love this bastard of an angel so much,_ Crowley thinks, accidentally, helplessly, and closes his eyes in joy and despair.

Well, fuck.

(He’s tried so hard not to just… say it like that. Not even to himself.)

He wants to kiss his stupid, rules-lawyering face.

Which is such a colossally terrible idea. Aziraphale is… he’s had an awful past few weeks, he’s vulnerable, he doesn’t need a demon slobbering over him when he’s only asked for a little company, he—

Aziraphale feels safe with him—Crowley knows perfectly well that Aziraphale would never have said any of those things earlier if he didn’t, wouldn’t have risked even hinting at questioning Heaven and its policies, would never have let himself dare to articulate any of it, and that’s not even to mention lying here in a demon’s arms—and Crowley would never want to spoil that because—

There’s no way Aziraphale is ready for this, and maybe neither is he, because he doesn’t want to seduce him or push him, because—

He’s Aziraphale’s _friend,_ bless it all to Heaven, and Crowley can be a good friend. He can. And not risk ruining everything just because he wants—

And then he hears his own thought process. Not ‘you can’t do that, you pathetic excuse for a demon,’ not ‘demons don’t have friends, and you shouldn’t even want to,’ nor even ‘there’ll be the worst kind of Hell to pay if they find out.’ Instead—

Fuck him, he’s doomed in every way.

Weird how it doesn’t really feel like being doomed.

Crowley tries to pull himself together—Aziraphale is talking again, and his tone is troubled.

“Admittedly, I didn’t think… about how long it could go on. You know how much I hate poking about with humans’ memories, but…” His voice drops, low and weary and ashamed. “Perhaps I should… just go. What good am I really doing here?”

Crowley snorts. “What? Angel, you’re helping.”

“I’m still not doing enough.”

Crowley reaches up with his free hand, taps smartly on the back of Aziraphale’s where it’s lying, near his face. “All right, listen,” he says, low but sharp. He lets his fingers rest there. “Let’s say... and this is a _rhetorical question,_ angel—“ Can’t have him getting soppy or anything. “What if— Say you have a blister, right? And suddenly—poof, healed. That feeling. One minute it’s awful, and the next, like—like cool water rushing through you, that relief. Breath-taking, right?”

Aziraphale turns his head. “How do you know about that?”

Crowley twitches, rolls his eyes. “Never you mind, this is all rhetorical.” The angel doesn’t press. (He should know better than to ask at all; did he forget where Crowley reports to?)

“My _point_ is,” Crowley continues, “it’s a small thing. No skin off m—off anybody’s nose, really. And not like it fixed everything.” Hardly anything, really. “But... maybe made a difference.”

“It did.”

Crowley chooses to ignore this, especially the warm, low tone of it, and rambles on. “So. You don’t think the humans feel the same? Not just something quick, ‘poof’ like that. You’ve been here a while now—how do you think _they_ feel when someone draws water so they don’t have to, brings them a poultice, makes them smile for even a minute in the middle of—the point is—“ Crowley shifts his hand away. “Little things matter,” he mumbles. _Wet feathers,_ he thinks _._

He doesn’t expect it to just solve everything—there’s no easy solution here. He just wanted to make his point.

The room is dark and still, the thrush call sounding again outside. Until Aziraphale takes a shuddering breath. “Oh, I— Why are you the one who— and I just don’t know how to....” His voice is thick, that same horse-trampled quality as earlier.

“Shhh,” Crowley says, and gathers him closer. Aziraphale’s shoulders are rounded with misery, trembling; the back of his collar is pulled awkwardly taut, fraying at the edge. His pale hair curls at the base of his skull, above his bare neck.

After a moment, he asks, quietly, “Angel. Am I really making it worse.” Thinks: _Do you want me to go?_

Aziraphale is silent for a long moment. Then he whispers, “Crowley, you’re the only being I wanted to see when I walked through that door.” His hands clasp Crowley’s free one, and he clutches it, holds it against the center of his chest, his head bending down over it.

Crowley wants to kiss the soft back of his neck. He wants it so much, it feels like his whole throat is clawing towards it, desperately.

“I wanted to tell you that,” Aziraphale whispers. His breath is warm against Crowley’s fingers.

He swallows, prickling, tingling. He wants—please, god, he wants—

He ducks his chin and presses his forehead there instead. “I’m glad you did, angel,” he whispers back.

He breathes, breathes, breathes, warm into the space between them (right where white wings would be), and feels Aziraphale shaking in his arms, still clutching his hand. Nothing he can do will just fix this, and that hurts, too. And some things he could do—well. _Kiss it worse,_ crosses his mind in a childish tone, sing-song and mocking.

He wants to. But he won’t. Won’t make it worse, or more complicated, or harder. (Echh, he thinks distantly, he really is the worst at demoning.)

Tense, Aziraphale twists his neck, turning his face towards the pallet. “It’s all too complicated, I’m not made for this. And I don’t know how to… _resolve_ any of it.” He takes a shuddering breath, so obviously a choked back sob that it hurts Crowley’s throat just to hear it. “Also, I’m sorry you have to listen to me whine, I’m aware it’s—”

“Shhh, you’re fine, angel.” Crowley bends his lower arm, reaches up and strokes Aziraphale’s head, soothing. “Life’s complicated. You don’t have to figure everything out tonight.”

“Oh. I… I suppose you’re right.” Aziraphale keeps holding onto Crowley’s other hand, hard enough that Crowley can feel his heart beating, but some of the tension goes out of his back, his neck. “That’s—that’s good advice.”

Crowley blinks in the darkness. “Huh. It is, isn’t it.”

Aziraphale almost laughs, as if it was a joke. “I’m so tired, Crowley,” he whispers.

“I know.” He keeps petting Aziraphale’s head, fingers running through his soft, soft hair. _Nice to’ve been right about the softness,_ he thinks.

He guesses… it’s not so hard to abide a boundary stone, if you’re doing it for something important. Or someone.

Aziraphale’s breath is evening out, ribs moving slower under Crowley’s arm. Their fingers are still tangled, and Crowley keeps stroking his hair, softly. It feels like floating in a bubble of glowing darkness. He gets to do this, right now, he thinks, with a feeling like wonder, like—

 _Contentment._ The word drifts into his mind. That’s what this odd feeling is. Oh, _that’s_ not allowed, he thinks idly. Demons aren’t allowed to be content; surely this is the most rebellious thing he’s ever done. Surely he should be panicking, but echh. He’s too tired for that.

Quietly, out of the darkness, Aziraphale asks, “Why are you helping? Why are you so good, dear boy?” His words are slow, drooping.

Crowley shrugs. He’s too tired to object properly to the premise. His eyelids feel heavy. Eyelids are overrated. “Why did you save me from the priest that time?”

“What?”

“The priest. The exorcism. In that pub.”

“I… Crowley, that was _five hundred_ years ago.”

“Mmhmm, Brother _Alric?”_

A long pause. So long that Crowley twitches awake when Aziraphale’s voice comes again. “It was just… the right thing to do.”

“Well, this is the wrong thing for a demon to do, so maybe it cancels out?” Crowley says sleepily.

“That’s not… that makes no sense, Crowley.” His voice is sleepy and slow, petty and disgruntled and warm.

 _You’re soft in my arms, what do I care about sense,_ Crowley thinks, nonsensically. “Shhh, go to sleep, Aziraphale,” he mutters, eyes drifting shut, his angel’s name a precious ember on his tongue.

**Author's Note:**

> Historical notes: Eyam is a real town, and they really did have a bubonic plague outbreak from 1665-1666. They quarantined themselves for months, until the outbreak finally ended in November 1666, and prevented the spread to neighboring villages. A museum there now commemorates the 260 people who died, out of an estimated population of 350-800. 
> 
> Lindisfarne is an island and monastery on the northeast coast of England, and site of both the creation of the famous illustrated Lindisfarne Gospels, as well as an early Viking raid in 793. 
> 
> \-- 
> 
> If you'd like to come talk about Michael Sheen's unbearable face and other matters, join me on my Good Omens sideblog: [ineffably-soft.tumblr.com](http://ineffably-soft.tumblr.com) (Or check my profile for my fic-related blogs.)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Binary Systems](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20622524) by [cassieoh_draws (cassieoh)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cassieoh/pseuds/cassieoh_draws)




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